Originally posted here, this is something I created this time last year. A Midsummer Night's Dream was the first Shakespeare play I was introduced to. I came to know it through a series called Shakespeare: The Animated Tales - an anthology series of abridged versions of some of the most famous Shakespeare plays, each animated in a different technique. This was a co-production with the great Russian animation house Soyuzmultfilm, renowned for their use of different animation techniques under one building). I saw the adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream from the series as a seven year-old after my grandmother borrowed the VHS from the library. What has always stood out to me, both as a child and as an adult, are the fantastic scenes and the enchanted yet somewhat sinister imagery. Indeed, the fairies here aren't the flittering female creatures from a Victorian fairy story but the elves and goblins of old English folklore - dubious nature spirits of pagan origin feared by a superstitious population. Of course, as a child, I wasn't able to completely get the sexual undertones of the play (only the romantic ones); I suppose this picture was my way of visualising the sensual themes.
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